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406 published many short stories in &ldquo;Scribner's Monthly,&rdquo; &ldquo;The Atlantic Monthly,&rdquo; and &ldquo;Appletons' Journal,&rdquo; in which appeared his &ldquo;Boarding-House Sketches.&rdquo; He also published a series of articles exposing abuses in the administration of criminal law and in the management of prisons. He was consumptive, went to California by way of the isthmus, and died on his way from San Francisco to Honolulu, and was buried in the Pacific. At the time of his death Mr. Webster was engaged to be married to Una, eldest daughter of Nathaniel Hawthorne. He left an unfinished novel. His most notable stories are &ldquo;Our Friend Sullivan,&rdquo; &ldquo;My Daughter's Watch,&rdquo; &ldquo;The Clytemnestra,&rdquo; and &ldquo;An Operation in Money.&rdquo;

WEBSTER, Ebenezer, patriot, b. in Kingston, N. H., in 1739; d. in Salisbury (now Franklin), N. H., in 1806. He served in the old French war under Sir Jeffrey Amherst, and in 1761 was one of the first settlers in what is now Franklin, N. H., then the most northern of the New England settlements. There he became a farmer and also kept a tavern. At the opening of the Revolution he led the Salisbury militia to Cambridge, and subsequently saw much service till the close of the war, when he had attained the rank of colonel of militia. He was a member of the lower branch of the legislature for several years, served also in the state senate, and from 1791 till his death was judge of the court of common pleas of Hillsborough county, N. H. &mdash; His son, Ezekiel, lawyer, b. in Salisbury, N. H., 11 March, 1780; d. in Concord, N. H., 10 April, 1829, was graduated at Dartmouth in 1804, studied law, and rose to eminence at the bar. He was also a member for several years of the New Hampshire legislature. His death resulted suddenly from disease of the heart while he was trying a case. &mdash; Another son, Daniel, statesman, b. in Salisbury (now Franklin), N. H., 18 Jan., 1782; d. in Marshfield, Mass., 24 Oct., 1852, was the second son of Ebenezer Webster by his second wife, Abigail Eastman. He seemed so puny and sickly as an infant that it was thought he would not live to grow up. He was considered too delicate for hard work on the farm, and was allowed a great deal of time for play. Much of this leisure he spent in fishing and hunting, or in roaming about the woods, the rest in reading. In later life he could not remember when he learned to read. As a child his thirst for knowledge was insatiable; he read every book that came within reach, and conned his favorite authors until their sentences were in great part stored in his memory. In May, 1796, he was sent to Exeter academy, where he made rapid progress with his studies, but was so overcome by shyness that he found it impossible to stand up and &ldquo;speak pieces&rdquo; before his school-mates. In spite of this timidity, some of his natural gifts as an orator had already begun to show themselves. His great, lustrous eyes and rich voice, with its musical intonations, had already exerted a fascination upon those who came within their range; passing teamsters would stop, and farmers pause, sickle in hand, to hear him recite verses of poetry or passages from the Bible. In February, 1797, his father sent him to Boscawen, where he continued his studies under the tuition of the Rev. Samuel Wood. Although Ebenezer Webster found it difficult, by unremitting labor and strictest economy, to support his numerous family, he still saw such signs of promise in Daniel as to convince him that it was worth while, at whatever sacrifice, to send him to college. In view of this decision, he took him from school, to hasten his preparation under a private tutor, and on the journey to Boscawen he

informed Daniel of his plans. The warm-hearted boy, who had hardly dared hope for such good fortune, and keenly felt the sacrifice it involved, laid his head upon his father's shoulder and burst into tears. After six months with his tutor he had learned enough to fulfil the slender requirements of those days for admission to Dartmouth, where he was duly graduated in 1801. At college, although industrious and punctual in attendance and soon found to be very quick at learning, he was not regarded as a thorough scholar. He had not, indeed, the scholarly temperament &mdash; that rare combination of profound insight, sustained attention, microscopic accuracy, iron tenacity, and disinterested pursuit of truth &mdash; which characterizes the great scientific discoverer or the great historian. But, while he had not these qualities in perfect combination &mdash; and no one knew this better than Mr. Webster himself &mdash; there was much about him that made him more interesting and remarkable, even at that early age, than if he had been consummate in scholarship. He was capable of great industry, he seized an idea with astonishing quickness, his memory was prodigious, and for power of lucid and convincing statement he was unrivalled. With these rare gifts he possessed that supreme poetic quality that defies analysis, but is at once recognized as genius. He was naturally, therefore, considered by tutors and fellow-students the most remarkable man in the college, and the position of superiority thus early gained was easily maintained by him through life and wherever he was placed. While at college he conquered or outgrew his boyish shyness, so as to take pleasure in public speaking, and his eloquence soon attracted so much notice that in 1800 the townspeople of Hanover selected this undergraduate to deliver the Fourth-of-July oration. It has been well pointed out by Henry Cabot Lodge that &ldquo;the enduring work which Mr. Webster did in the world, and his meaning and influence in American history, are all summed up in the principles enunciated in that boyish speech at Hanover,&rdquo; which &ldquo;preached love of country, the grandeur of American nationality, fidelity to the constitution as the bulwark of nationality, and the necessity and the nobility of the union of the states.&rdquo; After leaving college, Mr. Webster began studying law in the office of Thomas W. Thompson, of Salisbury, who was afterward U. S. senator. Some time before this he had made up his mind to help his elder brother, Ezekiel, to go through college, and for this purpose he soon found it necessary to earn money by teaching school. After some months of teaching at Fryeburg, Me., he returned to Mr. Thompson's office. In July, 1804, he went to Boston in search of employment in some office where he might complete his studies. He there found favor with Christopher Gore, who took him into his office as student and clerk. In March, 1805, Mr. Webster was admitted to the bar, and presently he began practising his profession at Boscawen. In 1807, having acquired a fairly good business, he turned it over to his brother, Ezekiel, and removed to Portsmouth, where his reputation grew rapidly, so that he was soon considered a worthy antagonist to Jeremiah Mason, one of the ablest lawyers this country has ever produced. In June, 1808, he married Miss Grace Fletcher, of Hopkinton, N. H.

His first important political pamphlet, published that year, was a criticism on the embargo. In 1812, in a speech before the Washington benevolent society at Portsmouth, he summarized the objections of the New England people to the war just declared against Great Britain. He was immediately